I, Claudius

I, Claudius is a novel by Robert Graves, first published in 1934, dealing with the life of the Roman emperor Claudius. Graves' interpretatino of the story owes much to Tacitus.

The book was to have been the subject of a 1937 film, produced by Alexander Korda and starring Charles Laughton, but it was dogged by ill-luck, culminating in a serious accident involving the female star, Merle Oberon, which caused filming to be abandoned.

In 1975, the book, together with its sequel, Claudius the God, was finally adapted by the BBC and proved one of the corporation's most successful drama serials of all time. It starred Derek Jacobi as Claudius, Sian Phillips as Livia, John Hurt as Caligula and Brian Blessed as Augustus.